Kanye West - Dark Twisted Fantasy

There's just something very condescending about BIG! ARTISTIC! STATEMENTS! being praised by rock critics, seemingly only because it's a language they can understand.

― altered boners (rennavate), Monday, November 22, 2010 11:44 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

absolutely! but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen. anyway, i do think there's plenty here worth keeping, ambition aside.

The 42 people involved thing just makes me think of the scene in Walk Hard where dude has a whole studio full of people trying to male the Sgt Peppers of cutting yr brother in half with a machete.

Also I thought max was the og fake carles?

andy's review best aligns w/ my viewpoints

the 42 people thing makes me think of phil spector stuffing 42 guitarists in a room, except that actually sounded good

That's the thing -- BB's album doesn't sound at all stale or canned to my ears. The good to great songs take a good musical idea and expand it within three to four minutes. I know it's a false dichotomy, but very little on MDTF startled me like the stuttering bullfrog thing on "Shutterbug" (I know, I know -- it's been attempted on "The Whole World") or the juxtaposition of guitar and percussion on "Tangerine" or Jamie Foxx's bit on "Hustle Blood."

― look at it, pwn3d, made u look at my peen/vadge (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, November 22, 2010 10:43 PM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i think compared to a lot of other rap out this year, this stuff really wasnt all that novel.

im the og real carles

i dunno, rap music w/ huge instrumental suites & written as an exploration of the self & celebrity & ego & etc etc it all strikes me as rather unambiguously ambitious

whether or not u think that is a 'good thing' is up to you

yes

― J0rdan S., Tuesday, November 23, 2010 12:41 PM (14 minutes ago) Bookmark

yes its ambitious for rap music but is it ambitious for 'music' as a collective whole?

i love the big boi album when it's just rap music and not wacky novel ideas, & i love the prog retardation & excess of mbdtf more than the parts that resemble more closely rap music

yes its ambitious for rap music but is it ambitious for 'music' as a collective whole?

― ＿|￣|○|￣|○|￣|○ (dayo), Monday, November 22, 2010 10:56 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

smh @ there being a difference

yes its ambitious for rap music but is it ambitious for 'music' as a collective whole?

― ＿|￣|○|￣|○|￣|○ (dayo), Monday, November 22, 2010 10:56 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

what other music (right now) is more ambitious than rap/r&b? i'd say nothing -- so i'd answer 'yes' to this question

also that

idk, I'm just curious by what metrics does this sound ambitious, and the evidence you presented only make it sound ambitious within the landscape of rap

except it is rap. so, wouldnt it be more ambitious than a non-rap artist doing the same things, but without u know rza beats & john legend cameos & groupie poems?

In a Lil B world this doesn't seem to say AMBITIOUS, YO. Hell who didn't just rtde at seeing Elton John on here? How long ago was it he did the Grammys with Em? Yo Kanye our minds are blown you worked with a guy dead 2pac made it with first.

well, i think theres something to be said for making something ambitious that lots of ppl want to hear vs. making something ambitious that a niche fanbase will put up with in small doses

idg that last point you made deej

im talking about lil b ambitious vs. kanye ambitious. you're as ambitious as your audience can let you be. in a merzbow world, how is kanye ambitious??

lil b is ambitious in a totally different way

oh I meant the one before that one, about "so, wouldnt it be more ambitious than a non-rap artist doing the same things, but without u know rza beats & john legend cameos & groupie poems?"

i think he means: its more ambitious for a rapper to make a prog album than for a prog band to make a prog album

lil b is ambitious in terms of work ethic & promotion & conceptualizing a persona (obv) but i mean straight music qua music, lil b is not on a 'twisted fantasy' level

Way to wimp out and even pixelate the image inside the CD booklet Kanye.

But I'm not sure Kanye has ever given a flying fuck what his audience thinks?

Way to wimp out and even pixelate the image inside the CD booklet Kanye.

― "I am a fairly respected poster." (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, November 22, 2010 11:11 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

lol record labels -- ask nas about this

for real?? there are really high profile interview quotes w/ him reflecting on the nature of being popular & keeping / losing an audience that i havent even gone out of my way to find but seem to have floated up at me since the hype cycle for this thing started xp

anyway, all I'm asking is what's musically ambitious about this album, i.e. ambitious about the music in and of itself. like if you took a music fan and made him listen to this w/o presenting any of the backstory, the Kanye narrative, the football team that he assembled for all of the lights, would he walk away being like "this is the most ambitious album I've ever heard! 10.0!"

think the closest we've come to that is DJP liveblogging itt

like my problem with this album is that for all the music crit adulation, the album itself just isn't all that interesting to listen to, and the extra-musical ambitions and drama don't really translate into interesting musical compositions

lol record labels -- ask nas about this

Well, that was a little different, but I'm surprised Cudi can get away with topless girls in his booklet but someone like Kanye can't get away with a fucked-up cartoon.

anyway, all I'm asking is what's musically ambitious about this album, i.e. ambitious about the music in and of itself. like if you took a music fan and made him listen to this w/o presenting any of the backstory, the Kanye narrative, the football team that he assembled for all of the lights, would he walk away being like "this is the most ambitious album I've ever heard! 10.0!"

think the closest we've come to that is DJP liveblogging itt

like my problem with this album is that for all the music crit adulation, the album itself just isn't all that interesting to listen to, and the extra-musical ambitions and drama don't really translate into interesting musical compositions

― ＿|￣|○|￣|○|￣|○ (dayo), Monday, November 22, 2010 11:14 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i think there are some moments on here for sure, although i dont imagine playing this record very often, but a lot of this stuff def feels new or un-covered by other artists. i think its a fairly novel album, expensively so, so i see 'ambitious'

Way to wimp out and even pixelate the image inside the CD booklet Kanye.

― "I am a fairly respected poster." (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, November 22, 2010 11:11 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

lol record labels -- ask nas about this

― J0rdan S., Monday, November 22, 2010 10:13 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark

What are you talking about... my version has it non-pixelated. Sucks to be Amurrican, I guess.

yes its ambitious for rap music but is it ambitious for 'music' as a collective whole?

― ＿|￣|○|￣|○|￣|○ (dayo), Monday, November 22, 2010 8:56 PM (15 minutes ago) Bookmark

this isn't a dumb question. different genres of music are conservative and/or ambitious in different ways. MBTDF seem ambitious in a way that's consistent with a lot of 70s prog and pop: deeply personal to the point of being obsessed with the self as subject, drawing from wildly disparate sources, unafraid of looking a little (a lot) ridiculous. but these qualities are, or have been, less common in rap. don't think the comparison takes anything away from this record, kanye or rap in general.

Way to wimp out and even pixelate the image inside the CD booklet Kanye.

yes, sincerely, FUCK THIS

so disappointed

i don't think it's necessary to find it interesting in a good way to acknowledge that it's ambitious, dayo

I kinda think it's do if you're gonna give it a perfect score, samosa

like 'ambitious' should not be the only metric involved here

wtf "it's do" "it is necessary" obv

Way to wimp out and even pixelate the image inside the CD booklet Kanye.

yes, sincerely, FUCK THIS

so disappointed

― phish in your sleazebag (contenderizer), Monday, November 22, 2010 10:20 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT... it`s not pixelated.

now yr sounding like al, so im going to point out the obvious that i think most of pfork's writers probably also like the record

WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT... it`s not pixelated.

― altered boners (rennavate), Monday, November 22, 2010 11:23 PM (28 seconds ago) Bookmark

hey chill out i'm pretty sure that they know whether or not their booklets are pixelated

so wait whats your point dayo? that it's not ambitious, or that its not perfect, or that its neither?

oh man thanks rennavate, turns out I just had this blurry spot in my eyes every time I looked at this one particular page in the book

you wouldn't know it from reading the reviews xp to deej

right right i`m just being snarky but i mean that`s weird... maybe a decision for american markets? or maybe certain outlets?

didnt mean to get snide, also, for the record.

that it's not an interrsting album in and of itself samosa

Could be, I suppose, although hard for me to imagine going through the pain of altering one page from the INSIDE of a booklet for different outlets. I could totally see if it was the cover or whatever.

especially bummed cuz i bought it at a local shoppe, not some monster chain store. considering swapping it in for an unfucked version somewhere else, but money's tight...

Well contenderizer blows my theory right there, figured mine was because it came from a big chain. Sorry to derail the serious talk guys.

i'd venture that it's probably a thing about US/canada & not where you bought the album

wait my version was all pixelated too -- you can buy non-pixelated ones??

Anyway, going to bed now so I can listen to this on the train tomorrow so I can really have something worthwhile to say (theres a first time for everything I suppose).

Weird. Maybe it`s just us Canadians who get the uncensored version.

Here`s picture for proof: http://24.media.tumblr.com/preview.xe2JF5bKl0D7NY1x_500.jpg